St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1887-06-11

trade in silver bullion certificates as grain
and cotton certificates are now dealt in.
The head centre of the organization will
be the new Western National Bank, of
which eX-Secretary of the Treasury Man
nlng and eX-Treasurer .IOrdon are the
founders. Mr.. Manning and his associ-
ates have planned to make New York the
chief seat of the silver bullion trade, and
Will thus seek to transfer the control
OF the silver market from London
to New York. Their plan of operation
is to have silver bullion in large quanti-
ties deposited with the Western National
Bank or elsewhere, issue certificates
against the bullion so deposited, and
have these certificates traded in very
much as grain certificates are in Chicago
or as stock certificates are here. To ac-
compllsh that, however, it will be neces-
sary to secure the cooperation of the
governors of the Stock Exchange in or
der to secure listing Of the proposed sill
yer certificates on the exchange. If that
can be done, the plan will be carried out,
and transactions in silver certificates will
become as marked feature of the Stock
Exchange business as trading in gold in
the days of greenback depreciation
Perhaps it may even come to pass that
there will be silver-room, as there was
once gold-room, and, in any case, the
trading here will be the controlling force
in the silver market, precisely as the sale
OF Indian council bills on London is now
the controlling force.
Conrad n. Jordan, vice president of
the bank, was asked to-day if such a
scheme was on foot. At first, Mr.. Jordan
seemed utterly obvious of it's existence,
but the production of further facts CON
WINGED him that he did know something
about it. Said he: "Such a scheme is on
foot, but not with us exclusively. There
are number of men getting this idea
into shape, but it will not be ready to be
made public for several weeks yet If any
thing is published about it it will iniure
the scheme very much. The Western
National Bank will not speculate in
silver We shall never buy an ounce.
Ii anything suggesting a speculative pur-
pose on the part of the bank is pub
lished, | shall publicly disavow the whole
thing. We are willing and ready to issue
certl1lcates for silver, or, rather, act as
registrars organization, but we shall not
do anything else, for we propose to do
only legitimate banking business.
London now controls the silver market
of the world. If this scheme goes
through, as it surely will, that control
ing power will be in this city. This,
you will readily observe, will be great
thing for us. Instead of our being de-
pendent upon London for the price of
silver, London will have to depend upon
u.s.
Mr.. Jordan said that his friends un-
doubleday proposed to speculate in silver,
but the bank would not do so in any
way. Mr. Jordan continued ''The or
ganization of the scheme has so far pro- |
crossed that tlfe form of certificate is
now being discussed It will be ready |
fer the public in about two weeks / +
have been called an enemy of silver, but
am not. But the silver dollar can never
be dollar. It's all bosh. l would have |
no dollars; silver is not used enough. |
Every silver dollar coined shows the dis |
use OF silver. | should only have halves,
ten-cent pieces, etc, each to weigh in |
proportion to an amount equal to dol |
lar. Ii the government persists in it's
present aruinous policy, there is no tell
ing where things will end. America is
the largest producing country, and
it is our idea to get control of our own
market and that of South America.
Nec I0rE Commercial Adgertiser.